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The world appeared to come to a standstill around me when I read the news about you leaving the club at the end of the season. Funny story about where I read it- I came across the article at the Singapore Stadium, where your team was to come play the International Champions Cup along with Paris Saint-Germain and Atletico Madrid.
I now know why the sky came falling down with a torrential downpour the whole time I kept going back to the article. A collective cry of sadness perhaps, from the city whose Arsenal Fanbase is second to none.
Then came the flood of social media posts, and I wanted to be a part of it too, but I knew my voice would drown in the floodgates that had just opened. I know this open letter will far from suffice, but a few words on Instagram wouldn’t do justice to what emotions I felt after hearing the news.
I knew this day was imminent- a whole bunch of them thought you had overstayed your welcome and I knew you’d come to this decision one day- Even with that in mind, I sure as hell am not ready to see another face in the dugout.
My introduction to football
Like every Indian kid on the block who knew nothing about football, I did what every kid would logically do - looked up the big football clubs. I read about great teams and their history spreading over pages I couldn’t count - but only one team caught my eye - yours.
That was maybe because your name was Arsene Wenger, and the club was Arsenal. I thought you owned the club! I immediately wanted to own a club and name it after myself!
Only after digging in deeper I found out that you were the manager, and as the manager, you led the team every week into the stadium, with your head held high. The more I read about you and your team, I found something that I related to- just like one of your Invincibles, Dennis Bergkamp, said ever so rightly-
“ You don’t support a club just because of players or trophies. You support them because you found yourself there, a place where you belong.”
Oh, how true that statement was, relevant even today. This was 10 or 11 years ago, When I was just a fat kid with braces who barely knew how to kick a football straight who knew then what football meant to him.
“Le Professeur” they called you was it? A teacher you were indeed, showing England that football could be played with grace and technicality, and it need not be the physically dominant game that the people were used to.
The change from Highbury to the Emirates Stadium
Fresh from the FA Cup victory, and the Invincible season only your recent past, everyone hoped it would continue. Alas, like the succubus to a devout Catholic, the financial pressures got to you, taking away your means to build a new team around the ageing and departing Invincibles.
One by one they left you - Patrick Viera left, Robert Pires left, Dennis Bergkamp retired and then the striker you made - the lanky teenager turned deadly striker Thierry Henry left you too, all looking for a fresh challenge.
You were now left with a team that was ripped threadbare- A team that was not going to cope with the might of Manchester United the newly cash-rich Chelsea and the ever-present Liverpool - yet you managed to do the unthinkable and bring home a top-four finish almost every year, even with your best players leaving you every season.
The letdowns, the heartbreaks, the frustrations, and the relief
The fans who were so accustomed to the greatness that you showed them you were capable of- A cup double in your third year, another in 2002, retaining the FA Cup the next year, and of course the 49 game unbeaten Invincible side that won the Golden Premier League began to show signs of uneasiness and had disgruntled voices when speaking about you.
They felt you were past it and wouldn’t be able to do it again. For nine excruciating years, you waited for another trophy - you had 7 in your first 10. The murmurs became chants, chants became banners, and the banners became planes.
Yet you stuck with a team that you sacrificed everything for. You sacrificed so much that you picked the club over your wife. I know how heartbroken you must have felt when you lost the League Cup final in 2011, but as the quintessential proverb goes - “good things come to those who wait” the wait ended in 2014 with that breakout year of Aaron Ramsey ending your drought.
Throughout the time I started supporting the club, I had never actually seen you lift a trophy- Sure I had seen videos of you lifting them, but never live. I had never seen you smile so wide, a smile that is forever swathed in my memory - A smile that I wanted to see year after year.
You did manage to win three more after that, putting you up there as the manager that had single-handedly won more FA Cups than any other, but it wasn’t enough for the fans - and rightly so - we were so used to the great football and we knew it was capable of winning everything there was to offer only to come short year after year.
The bedrock of the team - Taking the hits, but yet keeping the team from sinking
There are people who say things that would hurt any normal person, and even more so if they were said week in week out, but you stood there like Simba when accused of killing Mufasa - knowing that you’re not the only one to blame, but taking it all silently.
Looking back at some of the teams that you’ve fielded, I’m surprised that you’ve had the courage to even send them out! But you did, and for the most part, you were successful in what the club wanted you to do. But we wanted more - as humans we are greedy, and why shouldn’t we be? After all, you were the one with the most amongst them all.
With every questionable decision that you’ve made in the past, you’ve given us many more special moments to keep in mind. I don’t know many people who have turned down the riches of PSG, the might of Real Madrid, and the heritage of the three lions all in one life, but I do know you.
You have been an absolute gentleman throughout and I really hope this is not the end of your Arsenal Journey and whoever comes in next has really big shoes to fill, but I shall miss that shock of white hair and the grim face you make while trying to zip up your jacket in the dugout.
You entered a bronze haired young’un, but you leave a silver-haired legend.
Merci, Arsene.
